


Bunnyhug: A Samwell Story in Six Parts

by sylviarachel



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Coming Out, Found Family, Multi, Obscure Canadian vocabulary, saskatchewan, supportive parents
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-03
Updated: 2017-11-03
Packaged: 2019-01-28 18:04:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12612312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sylviarachel/pseuds/sylviarachel
Summary: The Samwell Men's Hockey team thinks they know aaaalll about Canadians. Jake Dutchyshen of Swift Current, Saskatchewan, is here to correct that misconception.Featuring Captain Bitty, Not Actually Chill Nursey, Heart-Eyes Chowder, a Bunch of Frogs, Chirping, Shenanigans, Hockey, and True Love.





	Bunnyhug: A Samwell Story in Six Parts

**Author's Note:**

> Beta'd by turifer, MapleLeafCameo, and my friend C -- thanks, y'all! :)
> 
> Any character you recognize belongs to the great & powerful ngoziu.

**I. 2014**

Jake Dutchyshen's older brother Josh put his first pair of skates on him when he was, like, two, and Jake has been playing hockey since before he started school -- if not playing actual hockey on an actual rink, then playing shinny on the Creek or floor hockey at school or road hockey in front of the house in the summer. And, like, Jake doesn't want to brag or anything, but he's pretty good. Good enough that by the time he was in Grade 7, coaches were talking to him about playing in Juniors in a few years.

So it's a surprise to a lot of people when Jake doesn't put himself in for the WHL draft.

"Are you sure about this, son?" is a question he gets very, very used to hearing, from everyone from his dad to random people at church. "I want to go to university," he says, over and over. "I love hockey, but I just think it makes sense to keep my options open. I'd rather play at university than in the Dub, if I had to pick.” If they persist, he points out that lots of guys get signed from NCAA teams.

But it seems like a lot of people Jake knows (and also a weirdly large number of people he doesn't really know, and he's really not sure why they would care either way) were expecting him to go play in the WHL and like ... be Swift Current's Braden Holtby. (Which is _ridiculous_ because Holtby's a _goalie_ , for fuck's sake. Like. A kick-ass goalie, and a great human being! But a goalie. Jake is _so_ not a goalie. What Jake himself would actually rather be is Swift Current’s Joe Juneau, although he’s not a forward and doesn't think aerospace engineering is exactly his thing.) When his little brothers, Jackson and Jonas, find out, they’re actually kind of mad at him for a while for, like, ruining their cred with the Grade 6 crowd.

Mom, though. Mom hugs him really tight and stands up on her toes to say in his ear, "I am _so proud of you_ , Jakie. Whatever you decide to do with your life, you're going to be amazing at it."

... and Jake kind of knows she's hoping he'll choose some career that doesn't involve hurtling around a sheet of ice at high speed with knives strapped to his feet and smashing into people.

Anyway, Jake's honestly not sure whether he ever wants to play pro hockey or not, but he's heard enough about what goes on in Juniors to be pretty sure the WHL is not for him. For one thing, he's actually reasonably serious about school, and really into some of his classes -- math and chem, in particular, are way more interesting than junior high led him to expect. And for another ...

Well, for another, the WHL doesn't seem all that likely to have a GSA or an LGBTQ+ Social Club.

Not that Jake's actually worked up the courage to join either one. But, like, it's comforting to know they exist, and people belong to them.

Also, the Swift Current Swifts -- the Midget AA team he's been playing on since he was 15 -- may not be WHL level, but they're pretty damn good, and they're a good group of guys that Jake can mostly sort of tentatively imagine maybe someday telling something like, "I think I'm probably not totally straight?" without getting beaten up or, like, shunned forever. Like, they'd chirp him into the next century, sure, but not, like, in a nasty way?

At least, he’s pretty sure they wouldn't be nasty.

Probably.

 

**II. 2015**

Jake has kind of had the best of both worlds going on most of the way through high school, with interesting classes that, not to brag or anything, he does pretty okay in, and decent teammates and classmates, and being so obviously super busy with school, homework, hockey, and chores that no one bugs him too much about not really dating ever, plus plenty of really good hockey to play. By the end of the season in his Grade 11 year, he's got basically the best D-man stats in the league, so it shouldn't be so surprising when, during the first semester of Grade 12, American NCAA teams (including some he's never even _heard_ of) start scouting him.

That's what Jake's dad says, anyway: "Of course they're courting you, bud! You're putting up fantastic point totals for a defenceman, your blocking numbers are solid, and your Instagram isn't an embarrassment like ... well, never mind." He starts sorting through the heap of brochures and stuff that Jake has just basically let pile up at one end of his desk, dividing them up according to some algorithm that isn't obvious to Jake. "Here, you should really think about Minnesota, Wisconsin, Boston College and Boston University, at least. Oh, and Samwell University -- Jack Zimmermann played there, you know?"

Jake looks at the brochure from Samwell University, on the front of which is a grinning bunch of guys including, yep, there’s Jack Zimmermann, who from his media interviews Jake would never have guessed _could_ grin.

Huh.

Dad, who never paid much attention to NCAA hockey until Jake said no to Juniors, is obviously pretty stoked about the idea of his kid playing for Jack Zimmerman’s old team -- and, yeah, with the way the Falconers have been promoting Zimmermann as their college-grad rookie, both hockey-smart and book-smart, the idea isn't exactly unappealing to Jake, either. As he looks more closely at the brochure, though, what catches Jake's eye is something completely different: the guy right in the middle of the photo, who is small and blond and kind of ... _dapper_ is the word that seems most appropriate, somehow. Or as dapper as a guy can be while wearing hockey gear minus a helmet, anyway. He looks ... well, he doesn't look like a stereotypical hockey player, anyway, and yet there he is with all these much bigger dudes crowded right around him, looking happy and comfortable and fine.

... huh.

Inside the brochure, among other stats and facts, Jake finds the phrase "voted America's most LGBTQ+ friendly campus every year since 2001!".

"Hey, Dad," he says. "You're right, this place looks good."

 

**III. 2016**

So here Jake is, in the players' lounge at Faber Memorial Arena in Samwell, Massachusetts, USA, meeting the rest of the 2016/17 Samwell Men's Hockey Team for the first time. The captain, to his astonishment, is the little blond dude from the brochure ("Eric Bittle. Call me Bitty! Here, take a seat and Foxtrot will bring you some paperwork and a mini-pie!"), and the manager is a tiny dark-skinned girl with cat's eye glasses and a clipboard who is adorable and, like, literally a foot and a half shorter than Jake but nevertheless very clearly the boss of Jake and everyone else in this room ("I'm Ford. People keep calling me Foxtrot? Whatever. Fill out this form, please! And these three, and this one. And do you want apple, peach or blueberry?"). Jake, who's still getting used to saying "freshman" instead of "first-year" or "frosh", is now suddenly the subject of a debate as to whether he should be called a Frog, a Tadpole, an Egg, or Spawn. It's very confusing.

The blueberry mini-pie he chose is also slightly confusing, but it's the most amazing thing he's ever eaten, so who cares.

He meets some other D-men, notably a pair of third-years -- oops, juniors -- who introduce themselves as "Derek Nurse, call me Nursey" and just "Dex". (Nursey is like ... light brown, with a fluffy sort-of-afro and super entrancing green eyes (and, yep, if Jake had had any doubts about being into dudes before, well, he wouldn't now), and projects an elaborate air of relaxed chill-ness that surely has never fooled anyone anywhere ever. Dex is really freckly, really ginger, and already looks kinda stressed even though the semester hasn't even started yet. They're both just an inch or two shorter than Jake, who is starting to realize that he's maybe gonna be the tallest guy in this dressing room. Again.) He meets a whole bunch of forwards, including Wicky and Ollie and Whiskey and Tango and Marky-who's-also-a-frosh, and gets kind of confused about who is who. The one who keeps asking him weird questions about Canada and maple syrup seems to be Tango?

Just as they're about to get started, and Bitty's looking around around the room and frowning and saying, "Now, where all is Chowder?" the door bangs open and a guy with floppy bangs and braces, dressed from head to toe in San Jose Sharks gear, bursts in.

"You're late, C!" yells Nursey from the very back of the room.

"Yo, Chowder! Is that a hickey? _Already_?!" says someone else from over at the side.

Ford -- Foxtrot?? -- silently holds up a Mason jar with a strip of stick tape stuck to it that reads "SIN BIN TRES", and Sharks Guy -- Chow? -- blushes bright pink and slinks up to the front to put some change in the jar.

As he passes by, Jake sees that, yeah, there's a pretty big hickey on his neck.

There's only one seat left, and it's next to Jake. Jake feels bad for Sharks Guy, so when he slumps down in the chair, Jake leans towards him a little and says, "Hey. I'm Dutchy. First- uh, frosh D-man."

Sharks Guy grins at him, showing a mouthful of braces. "Chowder. I'm the goalie! A goalie. Good to meet you! Wait, are you the guy from Canada?? Tango texted that--"

Up at the front, Bitty clears his throat loudly. "Chowder, honey, save it for after."

"Sorry, Cap!" Chowder says, but he doesn't actually sound all that sorry, and he nudges Jake with one pointy elbow and grins at him some more. "Wow, dude, is that one of Bitty's mini-pies? and you haven't finished it? Dude, you gotta--"

Someone kicks the back of Chowder's chair and he shuts up and faces forward, goalie-focused on Captain Bitty and the coaches at the front of the room. He's practically vibrating with excitement, although whether it's about hockey or the prospect of mini-pies isn't totally clear.

Jake finishes his pie.

*

Bitty and Foxtrot lead a tour of campus for the frosh (with Dex, Nursey, Chowder, and Chowder's girlfriend, who is apparently called "Farms", tagging along); the tour ends up back at Faber where they're going to get to see the dressing room, the equipment room, and the ice this time. The rink is _amazing_. Jake stands behind the boards with both hands on the glass, staring up at the afternoon sun streaming in through the vast windows, for ... probably longer than is normal, but whatever. Eventually, though, he starts to get chilly -- he is, after all, standing around in an ice rink wearing only a t-shirt and shorts -- and wanders back to the rest of the group.

"You were smart to bring a bunnyhug," he says to Ford, nodding at it. Her Samwell-red bunnyhug reads "SAMWELL HOCKEY" across the chest in white, and it looks like the kind that's super fuzzy inside.

"Sorry, what?" Ford says. Her voice sounds kind of weird, like she can't decide whether to laugh or be offended or run away, and when Jake looks up he realizes the group has gone weirdly silent and everyone's giving him, like, a Look.

"Dutchy, hon," says Bitty, in a concerned-older-sibling kind of tone, "what in the sweet heck did you just call Foxtrot?"

"Uh. Nothing? I was just saying, this bunnyhug?" Jake reaches out and lightly tweaks the hood hanging down Ford's back. "It looks warm. Do we all get one?"

Bitty looks at Foxtrot. Dex looks at Nursey. Chowder and Farms look at each other. The other frosh guys keep staring at Jake.

"Did he--"

"Did he just--"

"Was that actually--"

"Bits, is that like a Canadian thing? I don't--"

"Well if it _is_ , I sure ain't never heard Jack or Ransom say it--"

"He did! He called Ford's hoodie a BUNNY HUG."

"Oh-em-gee, I am _so_ tweeting that."

"That is like hella cute, bro."

"Have you guys seriously never heard someone say 'bunnyhug' before?" Jake exclaims finally, exasperated. "Literally everybody I know back home says that!"

"Wait, wait, wait," says Farms. "Where did you say you were from?"

"Uh," says Jake. "Swift Current. It's in Saskatchewan?"

Farms peers down at her phone, typing madly. After a minute she yells, "Aha!" and starts thrusting the phone into people's faces to show them something. When she gets to Jake, he sees it's a map of Canada in which Saskatchewan is bright orange, with the word "bunnyhug" written across the province in white, while the entire rest of the country is dark blue, with the word "hoodie".

Everyone is laughing like loons now, and everyone has their phones out, and Jake honestly kind of wants to drop through a hole in the concrete and just like ... _not be here_ for a while until they calm down. He buries his face in his hands.

Jake's phone starts buzzing like a Lake Winnipeg mosquito in his pocket, which can only mean that some hyperbolic version of this incident has already hit the Samwell Men's Hockey whatsapp group chat and now he will never, ever live it down.

"Oh my goodness, you hooligans, let the boy live!" says Bitty, exasperated. There's a smacking sound, and when Jake looks up he sees his tiny new hockey captain swatting at two six-foot-plus D-men with what appears to be a Providence Falconers rally towel. The other four frosh have clearly only just managed to stop exploding with laughter; all of them are red in the face (allowing for their differing skin colours) and avoiding each other's eyes.

Dex and Nursey back away from Bitty and his towel, clutching at each other's arms and still chortling. Bitty points an imperious finger at them and says, "Go on back to the Haus. Chowder, Farmer, y'all go on too -- Ford'n'I'll be there in like forty minutes with these tadpoles and I want those fruit pies to be nice and warm when we get there, Dex!"

"Yes, Cap," says Dex, nodding. The four of them turn and head up the stairs toward the nearest exit in a kind of moving wall of chirping and elbow-jabs.

Bitty turns back to the frosh, hands on hips. "Now," he says. "Where were we?"

"Locker room," Ford says, consulting her clipboard. "Then equipment room."

"Right!" Bitty claps his hands, grins, and turns toward the steps, gesturing them all ahead of him. "Marky, Butters, Rolly, Bunnyhug, Sperry, y'all are about to experience the wonderful yet tragically odorous Samwell Men's Hockey locker room."

"It's Dutchy," says Jake.

Bitty turns back to him; across his big-eyed, sun-freckled face, sympathy and kindness struggle weirdly with evil glee. "Oh, honey," he says. "I'm afraid you're Bunnyhug now."

"But--"

"I don't make the rules, sugar."

Which is ridiculous, because if the captain doesn't make the rules, then who the hell _does_?

Butters, the other frosh D-man, has both hands over his mouth but can't quite stifle a high-pitched giggle-snort. Jake sighs, and rolls his eyes, and trudges up the stairs.

When they get to the locker room and go looking for their stalls, he finds that his overhead cubby, as well as being labelled *18 DUTCHYSHEN* in Samwell crimson and white, has somehow already been decorated with a printed-out photo of two baby rabbits hugging each other. Butters and Rolly start snickering again, but honestly? The bunnies are kind of cute. Jake decides to leave the photo up there for now -- anyway, if he takes it down they'll just come up with something worse. Because hockey players.

Also, hanging on the hook below the cubby are two brand-new Samwell jerseys, home and away, with "DUTCHYSHEN 18" on the back and big rainbow You Can Play patches on the left sleeves. Jake strokes one index finger over the rainbow on his new home jersey; Bitty and then Ford catch his eye and smile.

Jake gets out his phone, ignores the 196 whatsapp notifications, pulls up the camera app, and takes a photo of his stall, rainbows and bunnies and all. "New year, new jerseys," he types carefully into the Insta caption box. "#Samwell #GoWellies #YouCanPlay".

One of these days, he's gonna be brave enough to add "#ICanPlay".

 

**IV. 2018**

"So, Pacer said your name is Bunny?" says Jake's Winter Screw date, looking him up and down. Mostly up, honestly, because apparently soccer players don't need to be tall? This guy is, like, baaaarely taller than Bitty. "Really?"

Jake shrugs. "Hockey nickname. You can call me Jake, since you're not a hockey asshole."

Hot Soccer Guy's eyebrows go waaaay up. "Uh. Yeah. Okay. Um, I'm Ariel. Hi."

"Like the mermaid?" Jake says, grinning, although it didn't sound quite the same -- more Ah-ri-EL than AIR-i-el. "And you were gonna chirp me for my dumb nickname?"

Ariel frowns a little, and Jake immediately feels like an enormous (literally enormous) hockey asshole. "I mean, shit, sorry, that was--"

"My parents are Israeli," Ariel says, a little defensive. "It's a totally normal guy's name there."

Jake can feel his face going red, all the way to his ears. This guy is really good-looking, and seems nice, and is apparently an amazing soccer player, and here's Jake fucking up this date by being a douchecanoe.

"You can call me Bunny," he says finally, looking at his shoes. "And chirp me about it. If you want."

"Nah," says Ariel, taking Jake by the elbow. "I'm over it. And not that interested in making bird noises, although I am interested in why you keep suggesting that."

Jake bursts out laughing. "No," he says, "it's--"

 

*

They dance. They eat. They talk. They dance some more. Ariel is a lot better at it than Jake, but only chirps him a little, and in a way that's ... kind of sweet?

It gets too loud, so they bundle up and go for a walk so they can talk some more. At three in the morning, they're drinking hot chocolate in Bitty's kitchen, still talking.

Ariel has lived in four different countries, plays piano as well as soccer, speaks three languages, and wants to study sports medicine. He wormed the bunnyhug story out of Jake while they were walking around the Arboretum in the snow, and immediately said, "That is the cutest thing I've ever heard. Why doesn't everyone call them bunnyhugs?" He has warm brown eyes and messy dark curls and a dimple in his golden-brown left cheek when he smiles.

Ariel Behar is basically the cutest and the most fascinating person Jake has ever met. He's not sure what makes Ariel want to keep talking to him, but Monica Dutchyshen didn't raise her boys to second-guess a good thing.

They fall asleep on the living-room couch, about a quarter of the way through _Moana_. When Jake wakes up in the morning, someone's put a blanket over them, which is nice, but someone has also stuck post-it notes with dicks drawn on them all over both of their faces, which is ... less nice.

At least nobody drew dicks on them _directly_ \-- Jake is pretty sure they have Bitty to thank for that -- and Jake manages to get rid of all the post-its before Ariel wakes up.

*

"Bunny's making heart-eyes at his phone again," Whiskey yells, when they're getting their clothes back on after the first practice of the New Year. "Get a room, dude."

The fine jar rattles under Jake's nose; when he looks up, annoyed, he sees Tango attached to it. "Who're you texting, Huggy?" Tango asks. "Is it that cute soccer player? The tiny one? That you went to Screw with?"

"Yes," Jake says, looking back down at his phone, "and he's not _tiny_ , and you can't fine me just for _looking at my phone_."

"Well, according to the by-laws--"

"Tony," says Jake. He looks up, locks eyes with Tango. "I mean this in the nicest, kindest way possible: fuck off, bro."

Tango gapes at him, mouth open like one of those weird African fish that eats its babies.

Then the entire locker room bursts out laughing (including, after a moment, Tango himself), and Jake gets about another six hours of not being asked who he's texting -- so he feels a little bit bad, but, like, not a _lot_.

Which is good, because the texts he was looking at, back in the locker room, were from Ariel (who's represented in Jake's phone contacts as a lion emoji, which is apparently a Hebrew pun??) and they say,

_OK I know this is weird and probably really rushing things but I really really like you and rushing into things is kind of my MO so I'm just gonna do it_

_Jake, do you want to be my boyfriend?_

And what Jake texted back was,

_OH HELL YES <3 <3 <3_

 

**V. 2019**

"Jake!" Jonas or possibly Jackson hollers into the phone. The call is from Jackson's number, but that just means it's one of the two of them, since they routinely borrow and/or steal each other's stuff. "Jake, go to CBC Sports right now! You gotta see this!"

"I'm running," says Jake. "I'll take a look later."

He knows what this is about, of course, because Bitty and Jack aren't assholes and they gave their ex-teammates a heads-up. They didn't know exactly when the article would post, but ... yeah, that's pretty much guaranteed to be what's going on here.

"Oh em gee, Jake, did you _know_?" Jackson or possibly Jonas says.

"Uh," says Jake. "That my former captain is dating a dude? Yeah."

"Nooooo. That he's dating _Jack motherfucking Zimmermann_."

"Language, dude," Jake says, and, fuck, when did he start turning into his dad?! "Again, yeah. I'm just not an asshole who gossips about shit that's not other people's business."

There are distinct sounds of a Dutchyshen twin-scuffle at the other end of the phone. Jake checks his Fitbit: negative splits, yesss!! And he's almost back to the Haus, which is also awesome because Jake is fucking starving.

The scuffling dies down, a door slams, and someone says very quietly, "Uh, Jake?"

"Jackson? What's up, little bro?"

"Um." Jackson clears his throat, swallows loudly. Jake reaches the Haus and instead of doing his warm-down stretches, just sinks down onto the front steps, swiping one wrist across his sweaty forehead. "Um, you know how, um. You know how you ... you told us you, uh, you have a boyfriend but you like girls too?"

"Yeah, Jax," says Jake. "You can say 'bisexual,' bud. It's not catching."

"Yeah, uh. Well, um, I. I think I might, I might _not_ like girls too?"

Jake sits up so fast he almost brains himself on the porch rail. "Jax, bud, what are you--"

"I, um, I think I might be gay?" Jackson's voice is small and tentative, now, like he's expecting--

"Thank you for telling me, little bro," Jake says, making his own voice gentle. "I know it can be tough to say. I'm proud of you and I love you, okay?"

There's nothing but sniffling from Jake's phone speakers for the next minute and a half.

Finally Jackson says, "Will you help me tell Mom and Dad?"

"Of course I will. It'll be fine, bro, you know they think Ari is great, so it's not like--" His phone buzzes at him, asking if he wants to switch to FaceTime, and he hears footsteps, then a door opening. "Wait, _now_? Jax, I'm gross, I'm literally dripping with sweat right now--"

"Mo-o-om! Daaad!" someone (Jonas) yells in the distance. "Jake wants to FaceTime!"

Jake rolls his eyes and goes inside to look for a towel.

 

**VI. 2020**

"Bunny!" A stick blade smacks the ice; without looking, Jake saucers the puck over to Butters, who sends it up to Marky, who pokes it in five-hole. The goal horn sounds, and Marky slams into Butters and Jake slams into both of them.

And then the buzzer goes for the end of the third period, and up in the stands, the Samwell section _explodes_. It's full of Samwell hockey alums, and also of Providence Falconers, and they are all yelling and cheering and standing up, and the entire Samwell team is piling in around Marky and Butters and Jake, and someone is yelling very, very loudly in each of Jake's ears.

Confetti drops and they do the handshake line and an NCAA guy in a suit comes out with the (really fugly) trophy and presents it to ... well, _the Samwell Bulldogs_ is what he actually says, but the trophy's right there in Jake's hands, so what-the-fuck-ever, right? (To be fair, the Wellies were the only team in the Frozen Four this year _not_ called the Bulldogs, so it's maybe not totally NCAA Guy's fault.)

Fans stream out onto the ice -- they're not supposed to, but whatever, the Wellies just _won the Frozen Four_ , so fuck it -- and Bitty is there and Dex and Nursey and Chowder and Caitlin and Ollie and Wicky and Tango and Whiskey and Ford and a bunch of guys who graduated before Jake's time and Jack fucking Zimmermann and like half the roster of the Providence Falconers and everyone is hugging Jake and yelling and sliding on the ice, and then -- and then --

Ariel is not very tall and not very broad (especially compared to a bunch of hockey players in full gear) so it takes a bit for Jake to spot him in the crowd, but then he does, and Ari's grinning so hard it looks like his face might split in half and his dark eyes are shining and Jake picks him up and swings him around because, okay, he's a fucking collegiate athlete and pretty much all lean muscle, so he's not exactly a lightweight, but Jake's running on adrenaline and feels like he can do _anything_ right now.

"I am so proud of you!" Ari says, right into Jake's face, when Jake lets him down onto his feet. "You did it! You really did it!"

"It's a team sport," says Jake, automatically but also truthfully. "We all played really fucking hard."

"I know, babe, but you're the _captain_ ," Ari points out. He's still grinning, a little wild. Jake realizes way too late that he's dripping sweat all over his boyfriend, and then decides that, well, if you're dating an athlete that shit is gonna happen sometimes and that's just how it is.

"We won," he says. His face hurts from grinning; the rest of him hurts from playing the most consequential hockey of his life. "We won. We WON!"

And he grabs Ari by the shoulders and leans down and kisses him. And kisses him. And kisses him.

Nobody yells "FINE!" because everyone else is busy celebrating, too.

Bodies slam into them. There's more yelling and laughing. Somebody shoves a microphone in Jake's face and bawls, "Jake Dutchyshen! Congratulations! How does it feel to be the second out gay hockey captain in NCAA history to take a team to the Frozen Four and win?"

Jake hates doing press, but right now he has something he actually wants to say. "One," he says, "I'm a bisexual hockey captain. Bi people exist! Hi!" He grins and waves at the reporter, who looks kind of taken aback, with the hand that isn't holding Ari's. "And, two, it feels amazing! Holy sh-- Holy _cow_ , we WON!"

There are cameras. Guys back home are going to see this. NHL scouts and owners and coaches and players are going to see it. Jake's slightly surprised to discover that he doesn't care, like, even a little bit. If he signs a team, it'll be as his whole self, and hopefully with a boyfriend who'll sit in the family section. And if that means nobody wants to sign him? Well, in a few months he'll have a bachelor's degree, double major in chemistry and statistics, and he can do something else with his life. Mom would like that, probably, a career with less concussion risk.

This sequence of thoughts produces a complicated mix of relief, euphoria, and sheer terror in Jake's adrenaline-addled post-victory brain.

Waving goodbye to the reporter (who, he now sees, is from Outsports, whoops, he could've been more polite about the bi thing), Jake tows Ari by the hand over to where Bitty is giving out hugs and Jack Zimmermann is giving out fist bumps.

Bitty hugs him long and hard, and there are tears in his eyes when he pulls away. "Look at my little Bunnyhug, all grown up," he says, wiping his eyes with the back of one hand. "You were amazing, hon. All of you, just amazing. I was so proud I practically exploded."

"You're why I came to Samwell," Jake blurts out. Bitty looks astonished and touched, his hand going to his heart like it does when he's feeling something too strongly to express it in words. "Jack's why my dad wanted me to apply, but _I_ wanted to come here because you were on the hockey program brochure, looking all safe and happy in the middle of a bunch of huge hockey bros, and I thought ..." He's putting this badly, he knows, but he's feeling a LOT OF FEELINGS right now, okay, and the words just keep tumbling out. "I thought if it was a good place for someone who looked like you, maybe it'd be a good place for someone who felt like me. And it was, and I think it's 'cause you made it that way, so like ... thanks, Bitty."

"Oh, honey." Bitty goes up on tiptoe to hug him some more, and this time reaches out to pull Ari and Jack into the hug, too.

*

The whole Samwell team and all the alumni end up at Jack and Bitty's house at like ... quarter to midnight, eating all the amazing shit that Bitty apparently stress-baked over Frozen Four weekend and just fucking _hanging out with the Providence Falconers_ because apparently this is Jake's life now? It's loud and crowded and there's booze and dancing everywhere but Bitty takes Jake aside, out in the semi-enclosed back porch, and says, "I tried real hard to make that team a welcoming place for everybody. But I didn't do it all on my own -- the whole team did, when I was captain and even back when I was a frog. The whole team, Jake, including you. And all of y'all kept on being that kinda team without me, because y'all are good people, and Jake, honey, whatever you do and wherever you go, you're gonna be just fine, okay? I believe in you, we _all_ believe in you, and you are smart and strong and just a real good person and we got your back, okay?"

For no reason he could possibly explain, but also probably because he's getting pretty schwastey, Jake bursts into tears. "I just outed myself on TV," he sobs. "And I don't care, like, at all, but I kind of do?"

Bitty holds him and rubs his back. "Where'd that boyfriend of yours get to, sugar?" he asks, once Jake has started to get himself under control.

"I dunno," Jake mumbles. He drags one sleeve of his Samwell Hockey bunnyhug across his disgusting snotty nose, ew. "He, um ... beer pong? I think?"

Bitty's big eyes go comically bigger. "Sweet lord in heaven, if Lardo and Tater have gotten hold of that poor boy--"

He grabs Jake's hand and tows him back into the house, where the party has gotten, impossibly, _even louder_.

*

The morning after his team wins the Frozen Four, Jake Dutchyshen wakes up in a cuddle-pile of boyfriend, hockey bros, sofa cushions, and blankets on an NHL star's living-room floor. When he goes to look for his phone to check what time it is, he finds a business card in his pocket for Georgia Martin, Assistant GM, Providence Falconers. On the back is written in Sharpie, CALL ME.

Jake blinks at it -- stretches -- carefully adds a contact entry to his phone, because you never know.

Then he kisses Ari's ridiculous bedhead (the only part of him currently visible) and goes back to sleep.

**Author's Note:**

> *Good Saskatchewan Boy Braden Holtby: [see here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Braden_Holtby.%20Fun%20fact:%20Lloydminster%20is%20half%20in%20Alberta%20and%20half%20in%20Saskatchewan).  
> *Actual Rocket Scientist Joe Juneau: [see here](http://www.thehockeynews.com/news/article/backchecking-joe-juneau).  
> *The "Samwell Bulldogs" story is based on the 2015 Frozen Four trophy presentation, at which apparently the NCAA rep referred to the winning team, the Providence College Friars, as the Providence College Terriers (the Boston University Terriers being the losing team). The teams of Ferris State, Yale, and UMN-Duluth -- all of whom have gone to the finals in the past 5 years -- are all called the Bulldogs; I don't know what the odds are of those 3 teams all being in the Frozen Four in the same year, but it would be hilarious if it happened.
> 
> The original version of this fic:  
> \- there is a new frog, big D-man from like ... Swift Current or some other smallish place in SK.  
> \- his name is like Jordan Kadyschuk or Jeremy Antonenko or Andrew Dutchyshen or something  
> \- he has played hockey all his life like a regular Saskatchewan hockey dudebro  
> \- except he's like not so straight? so Samwell seems like it's gonna be a great place to be and he's pretty stoked about it in like a low-key Saskatchewan hockey dudebro way  
> \- he has a normal hockey nickname like Chuck or Dutchy or Tony or whatever  
> \- BUT THEN  
> \- at some point during the Samwell pre-season, maybe during the taddy tour of the Haus or when Ford is handing out gear or whatever, this sweet dumb frog comments on one of Chowder's (many) Sharks hoodies as follows: "That's a sweet bunnyhug, bro!" [Or possibly Ford is wearing a Samwell hoodie and he comments on that like "Hey, sweet bunnyhug! Are we all gonna get one of those?"]  
> \- And everyone is like  
> \- WHAT  
> \- WHAT DID YOU JUST SAY  
> \- because the team is now kinda lacking in Canadians, now that both Jack and Ransom are gone  
> \- and anyway neither of them was from SASKATCHEWAN  
> \- and SK!Frog is like ... um ... ::points to it:: your bunnyhug, I like it  
> \- rest of SMH: THAT'S A HOODIE  
> \- rest of SMH: YOU CALLED IT A BUNNYHUG  
> \- SK!Frog: BUT THAT'S WHAT IT'S CALLED WHERE I COME FROM, WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME  
> \- Captain Bitty: LET THE POOR BOY LIVE  
> \- Captain Bitty: But also your new name is Bunnyhug, hon, sorry I don't make the rules that's just how it is  
> \- So now his nickname is Bunnyhug, fairly quickly shortened to Bunny and occasionally Huggy or Huggy-bear  
> \- and it's hilarious because he's like Holster-sized, possibly even larger
> 
> **EDITED TO ADD:** For Jake, picture a slightly shorter [Colton Parayko](http://www.webcenter11.com/tvtv/content/sports/St-Louis-Blues-Sign-Colton-Parayko-To-5-Year-275-Million-Contract-435924713.html); for Ari, picture a younger [Eliran Atar](https://www.famousbirthdays.com/people/eliran-atar.html).


End file.
